Hunger Games Origins Rewrite
by legoboyaz1
Summary: This is a rewrite of my older Hunger Games Origins story. This will detail my personal headcannon as to how the world becomes the Hunger Games.


**This is my personal head cannon as to how the world of Panem and the Hunger Games form. I will be mentioning real life political figures and events so if you don't want to see anyone of your favorite politicians being portrayed horribly, turn back now. Otherwise, if you send me hate you will receive a rather unpleasant response in return. Enjoy!**

First off, lets start with the history of the Hunger Games. How does the world of that universe come to be? In my theory, the 21st century is one long tragedy. The potential of humanity and its great path of civilization is entirely squandered in just a few decades. Since the book was published in 2008, it's not surprising that this is where the future begins to go downhill. It all started after the Great Recession of 2008. The divisiveness of the world is barely just beginning to take shape. For us, it's not known what's going to happen in the future as it seemingly gets worse as time goes on. The banks were bailed out by George W. Bush in our timeline and the recession starts to loosen up by the early 2010's. But for the Hunger Games world, there is no assistance whatsoever from the federal government. George W. Bush was assassinated before he could go for re-election and his vice president Dick Cheney becomes president. The Great Recession becomes the Second Great Depression as Cheney was only concerned about the wars going on in the middle east. The stock market crashed in 2010 and this is where the radical politics begin to take place. In 2008, Obama was elected as in our world, but the Republican controlled Senate and House refused to cooperate with any of his policies. Obama barely won reelection and the House became Democrat, but the Republicans would still refuse to work with Obama to assist with fixing the recession. Frustrated with how American politics produced little to no progress, we see the rise of fascism and communism in politics. The Democratic party embraced socialism by stating that it could work in a democratic society, whilst fascists were spreading conspiracy theories of a white genocide and that the left-wing government wanted to take away civil liberties for all. Civil unrest fueled by racial tensions was rising and people were being killed on the streets in race riots. The police would merely open fire on the crowds indiscriminately not caring who was shot and killed. In a stunning move by Congress, they passed a law that stated the electoral college was being abolished and that only the popular vote would count towards the election. This turned out to be a big mistake as people were rioting and killing each other as their pent-up anger caused them to inflict violence upon the other side. In the state of Florida, thousands of people were killed because of a fight between two crowds of fascists and communists. This led to riots, looting, killings, and lynching's against both sides, and caused martial law to be in effect. Law enforcement simply executed anyone who wasn't following strict curfews. This would be later referred to by Panem historians as "Bleeding Florida". Richard Spencer of the alt-right and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez an outspoken socialist both vied for the Republican and Democratic parties respectively and won the nomination. Many Republicans stated that if AOC won, they would secede from the Union. She responded by saying she promised to oppose their secession with force. The world held its breath as a very divided America voted for a historic election.

It turned out that AOC won the election. The day after her election, Texas seceded from the Union and formed the Lone Star Republic. Many other right-wing states in the South and the Midwest seceded to form a country called the Republican Coalition. AOC warned that the Republicans would face "disastrous consequences" if they didn't void their secession by March of 2017. Russia and China recognized the Republican Coalition as a sovereign nation the only two countries in the world to do so. NATO and other American allies hesitantly supported the remaining United States. AOC revoked the Second Amendment when a tragic school shooting occurred in Los Angeles killing 15 teenagers and wounding 12 others. She ordered every person to turn in their guns. If they refused, she said she gave strict orders to the police to shoot to kill if necessary. AOC then enacted her Green New Deal which caused businesses to flee elsewhere and for the economy to collapse; worse than both Great Depressions combined. She also started a mass purge in the government to anyone who wasn't onboard with her agenda as well as doing the same thing to the military. The Republican states refused to pledge loyalty stating that the United States became tyrannical and that they wanted to create a new government for themselves. When Russians and Chinese were found to be supplying the Republican Coalition with military training, equipment and weapons, AOC declared war on the right-wing states and Russia and China. This was on August 28, 2017. NATO followed suit on September 15, 2017 when Russia invaded Ukraine. China also invaded Vietnam, Taiwan, and the Philippines for complete control of the South China Sea. The countries of Russia, China, North Korea, Iran and their allies formed the Common Defense Pact. NATO, South Korea, Japan, Israel and their allies formed the Strategic Defense Coalition. World War 3 had officially begun because of the Second American Civil War.

Fighting and bloodshed was everywhere, and it seemed as if SDC would win the war. However, fierce resistance was shown by the Russians in Europe, Chinese in Asia, and Republicans in America. There were three stages to the war. The first phase (2017-2019) was called "The Blitz" as the CDP were ill equipped and unprepared to fight. This ended with the battles of St. Petersburg, Shenyang, and multiple cities in America being besieged by hostile forces. Millions of men and women died on both sides. The tide of war changed when the Russians decisively won St. Petersburg. The second phase of the war (2020-2023) was "The Stalemate" as both sides prepared their forces to either defend their homelands or invade the enemy. Russian forces pushed through Eastern Europe in the latter stages of the war. The Chinese successfully captured Southeast Asia and Oceania. The CDP was sure to win within the next few years. Sometime in May of 2025, CDP forces had stumbled upon horrific crimes, massacres, and genocides committed by both sides of the Second Civil War. Whilst the Russians and Chinese were by no means innocent with their governments, they both saw repulsive crimes not seen since the Holocaust in World War 2 and were disgusted. The CDP threatened to not assist the Republican Coalition unless they punished those who were responsible. The Republican Coalition reluctantly agreed. The battle of Washington D.C. was the bloodiest war in the history of humanity as it claimed over 20 million casualties. The city was almost conquered by the end of June 19, 2025. However, AOC had committed suicide, not wanting to face trial for crimes against humanity. Her final order to her generals was to initiate a massive nuclear attack against the rest of the world; regardless if they were friend or foe. Most countries tested nuclear weapons during the war, but they never thought that they would have to use them. Whilst World War 3 killed 1 billion people due to combat, the nuclear war that survivors called "The Great Extinction" killed 95 percent of the rest of humanity because not only did nuclear weapons fall on major metropolitan cities but they also fell on the arctic circle which caused climate change to nearly wipe out humanity. The attacks began at 6:18 p.m. on June 19, 2025.

Since most of the world had been subject to anarchy, it took around 800 years for humanity to rebuild. Strangely enough, technology had rapidly evolved and was used to better society as there were hardly any people around to denounce the progress made. After all, why complain about the controversial technology when tomorrow you might be dead? Everyone who did complain about the technology was either too unimportant or dead to care. The technology included cloning, genetic engineering, increased quality of healthcare and various other things. However, most Americans saw that democracy had been an absolute failure as it almost caused the extinction of the human race. People overthrew the government in what would be dubbed as "The Revolution". This was sometime around 2853. The newfound ideology won and declared the nation to be a military dictatorship; the name was also changed to Panem. Panem divided the nation into thirteen districts and based the Capitol around the former area of Denver, Colorado as that was where Mt. Cheyenne was where the former American government was executed. Each district had its distinct culture as well as the capitol. All of the districts were to provide certain resources to the rest of the nation. The people in the country were oppressed harshly by the government since none of the civilians had the same civil rights as the Capitolites. Many Panem citizens grew angry and wanted to re-establish a democratic republic where everyone was treated fairly and with respect. They started the "Dark Days" which was sometime around 2896. The war only lasted two years because the rebels could hardly fight against the Capitol's superior weaponry. The Hunger Games were started because the more moderate people in the Capitol wanted to teach a lesson to the citizens that war almost led to the human race's extinction. Since they didn't know if there were any other nations, they did not want the legacy of humans to only be death and misery. They tried to get the more radical Capitolites to see but the radicals didn't care much about the reality of the world. They purged the moderates in the government and therefore the knowledge of the past. Thus the Hunger Games were thought up in the year 2899 and started on 2900 because of horrific warfare and oppression that continued on until Katniss decided to take a stand against the oppression.


End file.
